The invention relates to a multi-media system for interactive presentation of user information, having an interface unit for reversibly interfacing to mass storage containing an interactive user program, accessing unit for selectively accessing the mass storage, a processor connected to the accessing unit for processing the user program, a display unit fed by said processor for displaying processing results, and a user actuation unit for, through selective user-actuation, controlling the accessing unit and the processor on a level of elementary user functionality.
1. Field of the Invention
Multi-media refers to at least a combination of text, stationary graphics display and moving pictures, the latter either in animation or in more or less full motion video. Additional or alternative features may reside in further visual display types, as well as in speech or other audio representation, motion, or other sensory communication categories.
2. Description of Prior Art
Generally, in a multi-media system, mass storage is advantageously unitary in that it looks and/or feels like a finite and localized object, such as a disc, box, card or the like. In that case, the physical accessing unit includes some kind of berth unit for removable positioning of the storage in or adjacent to the machine or system. The berth unit will be dimensioned according to the mechanical format and physical interactivity of the accessing means. Various such berth unit formats have been in common usage. On the other hand, the storage may be represented by a shared data base, and in particular, inclusive of a program base that is distant from a local user person. The machine typically is stand-alone, although connection to a local area network is not ruled out. A typical example of such a system is the well-known Compact-Disc Interactive (CD-I) system that is being widely marketed at present, although the present invention is not particularly limited to the use with or in such CD-I system.
In a system of the general category listed supra, the user may answer questions posed by the machine, select menu items, access particular displayed free-style elements, thereby activating a particular machine response, make drawings or compose other information combinations for display and/or storage, or just view/listen to a continuous recorded program while still allowing standard recorder functions such as play, stop, fast forward/reverse, jump and possibly others. Inasmuch as the CD-I system is being contemplated for a wide range of applications, for various categories of user, and for various levels of interactivity and operational speed with respect to its response to a user request or action, the inventor has felt a need to make the storage in an external storage compact on an organizational level, while also retaining compatibility between storage units and players that may both originate from various different manufacturers. Typical such machines may be standard CD-Interactive players, XT/AT personal computers and derivatives, and specific machines like Macintoshes.TM. and various others being marketed at present or in the future.